The Pittsburgh Steelers ended the 2019 season much as they did the 2018 season, by allowing their playoff fate slip out of their grasp. Slow starts and slow finishes permeated both campaigns, with strong runs in between. But while the results were the same missing the playoffs, the means were quite different.
Yet again, they find themselves undergoing the exit meeting process earlier than anticipated, which means so are we. But that they still managed to go 8-8 without Ben Roethlisberger, and with the general quality of play that they faced along the way, I suppose things could have been worse.
While we might not know all the details about what goes on between Head Coach Mike Tomlin and his players during these exit meetings, we do know how we would conduct those meetings if they were let up to us. So here are the Depot’s exit meetings for the Steelers’ roster following the 2018 season.
Player: Roosevelt Nix
Position: FB
Experience: 5 Years
There wasn’t much to the 2019 season for fullback Roosevelt Nix, unfortunately, who was limited to action in just three games throughout the season due to injuries. While he spent much of the season on the 53-man roster, he was a weekly fixture on the injury report before being placed on the injured reserve list toward midseason.
He did see action in three games, catching two passes on three targets for a blistering four yards, all of which came on one of the two passes. He did not record a rushing attempt, as he had in each of the previous two seasons. Additionally, his run-blocking left something to be desired at times this past season, and not just in results.
Of course, the fullback position has been in decline in the Steelers’ offense. After seeing 181 snaps on offense in 2017, he only played 110 in 2018. While he played 34 snaps in three games last year, that was largely biased toward one game that was atypical.
Nix’s main role on the team is on special team. He had logged over 300 snaps on special teams in each of the two seasons leading up to 2019, roughly 70 percent of the Steelers’ total special teams snaps, but he was limited to just a fraction of that, so there were hundreds of core special teams snaps that had to be made up for.
Still, don’t expect him to be going away any time soon. He is still under contract for the next two seasons, and will account for under $2 million in each of those two years. considering he is their only fullback and a core special teams player—add in the possibility of losing Tyler Matakevich and Anthony Chickillo—and that begins to sound rather affordable.
